DCI Akron (in theaters)

Tonight was the preview of the first shows of the top six corps from last year. WHEW that was a confusing sentence to write...

Time to write thoughts on the shows!!! In order of appearance.

• Blue Stars with the show The Blue Way: Some nice drill ideas, but it wasn't executed very well. Sloppy movement, but the music overall was entertaining and had some nice moments.

• Phantom Regiment with the show Turnadot: Pleasing to listen to with three ballads. Definitely a more difficult book (music and drill) than last year, but still not pushing it as much as I think they could. Great sound though...love their tubas. Some out-of-step feet and not polished drill, but overall, really entertaining.

• Carolina Crown with the show For the Common Good: Disclaimer...Crown is my absolute favorite corps so I'm biased toward them a bit. That aside...their show was phenomenal. INCREDIBLY difficult...insane drill that was great to watch. I love how they opened with Copland's theme "For the Common Man" and brought that back throughout the show. Their drumline was REALLY dirty though.

• Cavaliers with the show 15 Minutes of Fame: WHAT THE HECK??? Soooo not the Cavies I'm used to! It was choppy...did not flow musically. The guard was very obnoxious to me, got me annoyed and I just couldn't enjoy the show. I don't like the direction they're taking it. Only good thing to say is that their tubas had a nice moment and their pit was good.

• Cadets with the show 12.25: It's...Christmas. A drum corps is doing a CHRISTMAS show. Just getting my head around that...weird. It wasn't as terrible as I expected. It works, but it's not my favorite. They were very gimmicky with it, and I don't like that at all. Drill was great though, and the music was nice...some fantastic moments. Just...odd. I wasn't sold.

• Bluecoats with the show UnMasqued: Disclaimer...David is marching his second year with them so I'm biased. BUT...even if he wasn't with them, their show would have been one of my top two favorites of the night. Really emotional and deep...which a lot of the other shows didn't have. The performance was classy and incredibly strong. Fantastic hornline sound, and their DRUMLINE. HOLY COW I was wooting and hollering in the theater! And the cool part was that I wasn't the only one...there was an INSANELY sick bass run in there. The music left an impression (I walked out humming some of the tunes) and the drill was cool and also CLEAN...which was impressive. I like the first half of the show better than the second half, so I think that's my only complaint...but it was great.

Best part of the night? As the Bluecoats were leaving the field, they took their helmets off, AND I SAW DAVID. I first recognized one of his friends I met last year, Mike, but then I saw him and I screamed his name in the very quiet theater. I was very excited. :)